


Overcast

by theficisalie



Series: Desert Heat [6]
Category: Bandom, Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys (Album), My Chemical Romance
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-20
Updated: 2012-03-20
Packaged: 2017-11-02 05:53:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/365653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theficisalie/pseuds/theficisalie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With new security measures in place, Thriller's operation promises to be airtight and raid free. If it proved to be anything less, the Killjoys would be there within hours. But what happens when everything goes horribly wrong?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Overcast

**Author's Note:**

> Chapters 1-3.
> 
> beta: [restlesslikeme](http://restlesslikeme.livejournal.com)

**Chapter 1**

Frank blinked. It was a strange sensation, to be staring at the man everyone else saw in the mirror. He didn’t usually spend a lot of time in front of the mirror, analyzing his own face. The most time he looking into a mirror was when he was shaving, and even then, he concentrated on clearing his skin and not on how his chin was shaped, or how far up his nose you could see if he tilted his head back and to the side.

Fun Ghoul looked quite sure of himself, with his brows drawn together and his eyes shining vaguely in the dim light of the bathroom. He looked more like Frank without his vest and holster, but the monster mask-wearing criminal was spread along the yellow and black sleeves of his shirt, ingrained in the wasp hovering below his shoulder, sewn into every stitch of his modified arm guards. Party Poison had found two shirts that had looked vaguely similar, and Frank had cut them up and put them back together like Kobra Kid had done to him in the desert so long ago.

Had it really been two years? He didn’t have a watch anymore, had no idea what day it was back in the City, only what time it was out in the desert. The cool of the morning was fresher than the grumpy settling in of the night, and he could generally navigate himself around a day depending on what he felt like when the sun hit his protected skin.

His vest was thick, and kept his skin from becoming mottled too quickly by the radioactive rays, and it had these wonderfully convenient straps on its shoulders that fit his holster perfectly. Party Poison had traded away a good, working ray gun, three cans of Power Pup, and a small bottle of pills for it. He’d passed it over to Frank as he’d completed the transaction, and shook it in the gap between them when Frank had hesitated to take it.

“It’s yours now,” he’d said.

“It’s,” Frank had said, at a loss for words when it fit snugly between his shoulder blades and made him feel at home. Like a Killjoy. “Perfect.”

Party Poison had simply scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Of course it is. Don’t lose it.”

It was hanging on a hook he’d brought back from a dump and attached to the back of their bathroom door right now, a place where they could hang clothes and towels while their people were wet and dripping.

A fist rapping on the door startled him out of the mirror, out of his clear, hazel eyes, and made him jump for his vest. He tugged it on as Party Poison’s dry voice came snarling through the crack between door and wall. “Fuckin’ meeting,” he said. “Diner.”

“Right,” Frank called back, but of course, Poison was already stomping down the hall. Frank laced up his boots and spared one last glance over his shoulder to the mirror. Fun Ghoul gave a nod, and left the bathroom, tucking his hair behind his ear.

The Killjoys were already at a booth: Kobra Kid and Party Poison on one side, their backs to Frank. Jet Star was on the other, taking up as much space as he could without being obnoxious. He could see the clown hair bobbing slightly as the blonde head tilted to the side. Kobra was probably detailing their plans to hack another vending machine, or some stupid tech-related update like that. Frank preferred the humanoid innards of cars to tech, but he thought it likely that Kobra had a chip inside his head that told him what to do and made his movements jerky and erratic.

Their voices were too low for him to hear from the entrance to the diner though, and the look on Jet Star’s face was grim. His brow was furrowed in concentration, his mouth covered by his interlaced fingers. “So you’re saying,” he muttered when Kobra’s head stopped moving, “That this is a new one?”

“A new one what?” Frank asked.

Party turned a fraction to the side. “Fuck, Ghoul. When I say meeting, I mean you, come here, come sit in at the meeting. Don’t skulk around the edges.”

Frank shrugged, and approached the booth. He didn’t like to jump into situations headfirst if he could help it, which he usually couldn’t. “Kobra brought home another dead-end invention?” he asked.

What he saw on the table made his heart skip three beats. His feet ceased to work, froze on the floor that was gently wafting cool air about. His eyes didn’t widen, but for such a dramatic moment, he felt they ought to have at least made an effort. For a moment, he felt like he was standing on his own shoulders, looking around while time slowed down in front of him.

There were salt and pepper shakers on every table in the diner, even though there hadn’t been salt or pepper in them for a good six years. They were small enough that he could hide one in his fist if he needed to, but big enough that they had a solid base. Party Poison had found them and refused to disturb the strong, glass bodies. “Like little queens and kings,” he’d said, referring to some ancient game that nobody knew how to play anymore.

While Kobra’s face settled into a scowl, Party turned his head towards the other Killjoy. Frank could see a grin slowly blossoming as time sped up to meet reality again.

Right.

He reached out to the side and snatched one of the shakers, gripping it in his hand with the silvery head pointing towards his thumb. That would get him enough leverage if he lifted his arm up, to slam it down on the little red monstrosity. Something boiled deep in his stomach and he trusted that Kobra would be too angry about Frank’s comment, Party too amused, and Jet too focused on the other two to watch what he was doing. But his body was mostly on autopilot at this point, and he wasn’t sure if he could even be stopped.

The next thing he knew, amid a miniature tumult of shouts and voices, was that he was being held away from the booth by Jet Star. The siding of another table was digging into the small of his back, but he struggled, salt shaker clenched tightly in his fist, against the large man. He was about as strong as Jet, but not nearly as big as him, and the man had a height advantage that Frank couldn’t overcome with the angle his back was being pushed in.

“Let me _go_ ,” he ground out, eyes focused on the pill. Kobra snaked out a hand and snatched it up, and Frank pushed as hard as he could, kicking out at Jet’s shins as he did so. The man buckled, and that left Frank to leap at Kobra, defenseless in the booth of the diner.

“Stand the _fuck_ down, Fun Ghoul,” Party Poison growled to the tune his flasher whined out into Frank’s chest.

Frank’s chest heaved with the gun beneath him. His hand was still up in the air, holding the salt shaker as tightly as the slightly slick skin would allow. He glanced up at it, and then at Jet Star on the floor. The man was picking himself up with a grunt and a frown, but he seemed all right. Frank looked back at Party Poison. The man’s eyes were livid, flashing with a fire that Frank had only seen a few times.

“Drop,” Party Poison snapped through gritted teeth. He slid his gun up between Frank’s ribs and up his trachea until it was pressed into the soft skin under his chin.

Frank swallowed, the heat of the charged gun irritating the sensitive skin. The gun moved slightly when he did. Party Poison’s eyes flickered through flame to brimstone, and Frank’s hand obeyed the command. The salt shaker fell down, landing on its silver crown before bouncing with a sharp crack.

“Good boy,” Poison growled. He pulled his gun away slowly, and de-charged it before settling it back into the holster at his hip.

“You can’t,” Frank said, snapping his mouth shut when he saw the look Party Poison was still giving him. “You shouldn’t play with those.”

“Do you know what it does?” Kobra asked. Party’s head whipped back, eyes bright. Kobra leaned forward on the table. His hand was still closed around the red pill. When he uncurled his fingers away from his palm, Frank winced back into the table behind him. “This, do you know what it does?”

“No,” Frank said. “No, no.” He clapped his hands over his ears, but that did nothing to quell the screams bouncing around his skull. “No, no, no. Put it away.”

“Why?” Kobra asked.

Frank shook his head. His eyes were wide in his skull, and he couldn’t quite blink properly. “Put it _away_.”

A hand touched his arm, and he jerked away from it, eyes released from the red pill settled into the palm of Kobra’s hand. Party looked surprised. “Ghoul?” he asked.

“Fuck.” Frank turned and ran for the exit of the diner. He had to get away from it, escape the limits of its power, had to get the fuck away from the walls closing in on him. He couldn’t breathe, almost felt like clawing at his chest just to get some air at them, when he hit the blistering heat of the outside. It did nothing to put air back in his lungs, so he panted until he found shade, beneath a small table that Party Poison had dragged out here for Grace to sit on. He huddled under it, hands still clasped over his ears, eyes squeezing shut against the light. “No, no, no.” Bright, white light, from a whiter ceiling. White walls, white floors. “No.” Men and women in white, white skin and clothes. “No, no, no.” It was everywhere, in the water in the cups, the white. The only thing that helped was the black, the momentary escape from the blank void. “No, no. No, no, no.” Darkness with a promise of white light at the end of its too short tunnel.

“No, no, no, no. No no. No. No. Not back. I can’t go back. Not there. No.”

A strong arm wrapped around his shoulders, pulled him into a warm chest. Soothing murmurs floated from the mouth above his head as hands traveled up and down his arm, covered a hand over his ear and pressed his face into denim. Hair tickled at his exposed neck. His shoulders slowly relaxed with the rocking movement of the body, and his hands released their grip over his ears.

“There we go,” Jet murmured, voice soft and low as his hand pulled Frank’s down from over his ear. “Everything is okay. You’re in the desert, away from the City.”

Frank looked up at the tanned face, smiling at him beneath its reflective sunglasses. He felt a bit ridiculous, crouching on the desert floor, being soothed like a toddler who’d just had a nightmare.

“Look up at me Ghoul,” Jet said. He took Frank’s face in his big hands, wiping away tears Frank hadn’t even known he’d been crying. Frank obliged him, looking up at the eyes he could see when Jet moved his sunglasses up. “It’s all going to be fine. Nobody is going to make you go back.”

Frank’s tongue darted out to wet his lips. “The pill,” he croaked. “It’s...it’s from...”

“I know,” Jet said.

Frank pushed away from Jet in the small amount of space they had under the table. “You...know,” he repeated. His hand flew up to the back of his neck. “How...?”

“My wife,” Jet said. His brows pulled together as he turned from Frank to lean up against the wall of the diner. He let his legs stretch out in front of him, completely covered and safe from the sun.

Frank let himself sit, too, carefully watching the twitch of Jet’s fingers as he ran them along the edges of the buttons on his jacket. Jet’s eyes were dark, but not as dark as they could have been.

“My wife,” Jet said again, taking a deep breath. “She worked there. In...”

Frank sucked his lower lip into his mouth and picked at the chapped skin. “C,” he muttered.

Jet nodded. He wasn’t looking out at the desert anymore, but at something Frank couldn’t see. At something that wasn’t there. “They did some stuff to her,” he said. “Found out she was pregnant. You know how the Company is when they have assets working for them.”

Frank’s eyes flickered over to the worn siding beside them. “Not Grace,” he said, voice low.

“Not anyone anymore,” Jet muttered. He stopped talking, set his mouth in a line. For a minute, Frank could hear his laboured breathing, see the way he was blinking.

“You don’t have to tell me,” Frank said.

“You need it more than I do,” Jet said. “Just...I need a minute.”

Frank nodded. He moved so that he was sitting beside Jet, not quite touching the man, but not very far away, either. He could feel the warmth when Jet moved his arms to his side, feel the slight brush of fabric on fabric. “She came back angry,” he finally said. Frank glanced up at him, and saw that his eyes were closed. “One day, just. It seemed out of nowhere, but it had been building up for months. Somewhere around nine of them, I guess, considering. Said she wanted to get back at them, that we had to protect Grace and rebel. She had this plan, to join the Killjoys. Found out where they were going to be. And then, the day before...Scarecrows brought her to our door, and she was...gone. In here.” He tapped his forehead. “They knew I was in on it, someone higher up _knew_ , they used a closing sequence we used to use when we taught Dracs how to work properly. And she had...” He opened his eyes now, and looked at Frank. “I saw it when you were out, that first day. When I had to carry you from the car.

Frank hung his head, and pulled his collar up.

“Hers wasn’t healed yet. But she had it, I could see the outlines bright and clear. It was so fresh it wasn’t even oozing yet. And she just walked herself up to our bedroom and turned off.”

“Fuck,” Frank muttered. “Fucking bastards.”

Jet Star laughed. “Yeah.”

“How did you get over it? I mean, you’ve been with the Killjoys a while,” Frank said, glancing up at the older man. “How do you get over something like that?”

“For a long time I didn’t,” he said. “And then it just...hit me in the face like a bucket of paint.” He looked at Frank, and laughed again.

“Saw that, did you?” Frank said, sheepishly. “I didn’t have a flasher or nothin’. Had to make do with what I had, you know.”

“You’re a real trucker,” Jet said.

Frank frowned. “A what?”

“Saying,” Jet said. “From the old days. We should go inside before Party comes lookin’, I reckon.”

“Trucker,” Frank muttered. “Reckon. That’s where she fuckin’ gets it.”

“What?”

“Nothin’,” Frank said, and accepted the hand pulling him from under the table into the sun. “Just thinkin’ out loud is all.”

The door to the diner slammed open on the other side of the building, and Party’s voice grated across the shimmering sand. “You fuckwads better get back in here or we’re havin’ crash queen soup for fuckin’ dinner and I’m gonna like the fuck out of it. We’ll call it traitor stew and it’ll have your two faces on it if we don’t get this fucking meeting back on track.”

Frank looked up at Jet Star. “Think he’s gonna say it again?” he asked.

Jet Star held up a finger. “The door hasn’t closed yet.”

Party Poison growled somewhere on the other side. “Fuck!” he shouted, and slammed the door behind him.

“Always wait until the door has closed,” Jet said, a grin splitting his face in two. “But I doubt he’s joking about the stew, we really should go back inside.”

Frank’s nose wrinkled. “Fuckin’ Killjoys,” he said, leading the way.

“Fuckin’ Killjoys indeed,” Jet muttered behind him.

* * * *

Frank and Jet Star fitted themselves back into the booth. Party Poison was glaring at Frank across the table and tapping his fingers on the butt of his gun.

“You won’t jump me this time?” Kobra asked, smirking.

Frank folded his arms across his chest. “You shouldn’t play with those things.”

“Well, don’t you dare fucking smash it,” Kobra muttered. “You’ve got no idea what our people went through to get this little baby from the City.” He opened up his palm and let the little red pill slide onto the shiny tabletop.

Frank tried not to wince with the deafening noise it made. His hands were clenching each other under the table as tightly as they could to control the muscles in his shoulders.

“What we’ve got to do,” Kobra said, his eyes still on Frank, “is figure out what this thing does.”

“Process of elimination?” Poison asked. He was staring at Frank as well.

“They change their pill design once every quarter so that nobody can track what pill is what,” Jet said. “Elimination is no good. Except.”

“The red ones never change.”

Everyone who had glanced up at Jet Star looked back to Frank, who was staring down at his own inky hands. “I need another tattoo,” he mumbled, sweat beading on his neck. “Too much exposed skin.”

“What did you say?” Kobra asked.

Frank squeezed his hands together, knuckles already white. He couldn’t quite feel the tips of his thumbs, but was keeping his breathing mostly under control. “Skin,” he said. “You can still see my skin, even though I’ve put so much work into the ink.”

“Before,” Kobra muttered. “Before the tattoo thing. What did you say?”

Jet Star’s hand on his shoulder was comforting. Frank took in a deep breath. “The, uh, red ones. They never change. They’re always...”

He trailed off, throat closing up at the thought of the sinister eyes that had been chasing after him all of these years. He’d managed to disguise himself by dying his hair and growing it out, covering his skin with colour and pictures that bewildered the Dracs and Crows, but he couldn’t quite escape the little red pills and the narrow, black eyes.

“Mind control,” Jet said. “I think. I mean, I didn’t deal with Crows as much as I did with Dracs, and they got their minds wiped with a big pill and a bright, flashing room. But Crows take one of these every day, is it?”

Frank scratched his elbow, the one he’d covered up with a rose after it wouldn’t stop itching. It had bothered him for months, hurt even now before it was going to rain. There wasn’t a rash or a cut or a broken bone there anymore, but his hand moved before his brain could tell it not to. “Yes,” he said finally. “That’s. What it’s for.”

The muffled roar of a bike caught their attention. It drove a rod down Kobra’s back, made him straighten up, eyes bright. “Thriller’s here,” he said, snatching the pill that Frank was eyeing and popping it back into a vial. “He’ll come in here.”

“You told him we were meeting?” Jet asked.

“Who do you think got the pill?” Kobra’s raised eyebrow was enough. Party rolled his eyes and slid out of the booth so that Kobra could get out to meet Thriller, who was already strolling into the diner, helmet under his hand.

“How are my boys?” he asked, voice slightly scratched with dust. “Figured out what it does yet?”

Kobra crossed the last few tiles between them, and Thriller’s eyes crinkled at the edges when he caught Kobra’s hand. “We did,” Kobra said, tilting his head. “Thanks to Ghoul. And Jet.”

Thriller nodded. “I figured as much,” he said. “Jet. Party. Ghoul, hey.”

Frank looked up from his hands. He tried to remember what his face was usually like but couldn’t quite put a name to the expression and just nodded.

“You should come see my bike, I’ve done a bit of work on it.”

Frank blinked. “You finally replaced those rotted couplings?”

Thriller beamed, his white teeth gleaming in the bright light. “Better than that. But I won’t ruin the surprise. I’m just out here to tell you about our new evac procedures.”

“New ones?” Party poked his head out so that he could see Thriller. “What was wrong with the old ones?”

“More raids.” Thriller shrugged. “They’re stepping things up, and my Rats just haven’t been able to keep up. We like what you have here, though, your perimeters.”

“Thought you already had perimeters,” Jet said.

“Not your fancy-ass face-rec,” Thriller said. “Face-rec with the BLI logo in it. Sometimes they angle their faces so the cameras can’t quite catch their full heads, but they wear that godawful face on everything. Too much white, too, you’ve got that out here. I think we’ve got it so that they won’t be able to get in, we’ve got lockdown, too, once they pass a certain point. And emergency exits inside that nobody knows about but us.”

“What if you have a mole?” Kobra asked.

“The emergency exits are for Rat eyes only.” Thriller smiled. “Glitter came up with that, and suggested your advanced face-rec tech, too. I don’t think you have to worry about us getting caught any time soon.”

Kobra shifted his weight. “We haven’t even been notified about the last few raids.”

Thriller shrugged. “Didn’t want to worry you. I’m only going to be here for a little while,” he said voice lower this time, his words meant for Kobra’s ears only. “Got to get back to the tunnels.”

Kobra looked over his shoulder. Frank followed his gaze to Poison, who nodded. The pair headed off, linked by the hand. Thriller shot a glance over his shoulder at Frank before they left the room entirely. “Come check out my bike before I leave, yeah?”

Frank nodded, watching them go until Kobra’s door closed behind them.

“I’d better check on Grace,” Jet said. “She’s been alone for a while. Might take her out back to use up the last of these batteries. We’ve got new ones, right?”

“Yeah,” Party said. Frank got out to let Jet go by, biting his lip. Party’s voice once Grace’s door was shut made him snap back to the present, to the diner booth from where he’d been thinking about the melancholy look he could always see in Kobra’s eyes, the pair to Thriller’s. “How do you know?”

Frank frowned. “Are you talking to me?”

Party nodded. “About the pills. How did you know they were mind control?”

Frank stared. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he muttered. “We’re not supposed to share personal info, remember?”

“We are if what you’re holding back is going to get someone killed,” Party said. “I’m not done fucking talking about this, Ghoul. And my patience can only be stretched so far.”

“I know all about your fucking patience,” Frank muttered under his breath. Bike. Party Poison wouldn’t follow him into the garage because the man knew nothing about cars except that he really liked the way they looked. That was just as well: the cold metal wouldn’t betray him or make him think about his horrid past. And bikes were nice enough, like the younger brothers of cars. A weird, inverted version where their exhaust pipes were just out there for anyone to see.

Thriller had painted his bike a deep shade of red with odd purple highlights. Frank had asked him about it once, and he’d simply replied, “Purple’s my favourite colour,” with one of his infuriatingly knowing smiles. Nobody ever wanted to tell Frank _anything._

The windscreen was shiny and new, made from what felt like a kind of harder plastic than Frank had seen the last time he’d been allowed to dismantle the cycle. When he removed the siding, grease rag on his shoulder already slightly gray, he saw what he’d come here to look for.

“Electric?” he breathed, under his breath. This looked like a strange fusion between a Crow bike and the older, fuel-consuming models. Hybrid. It was a hybrid between the two, with a fuel tank that looked like it powered the engine unless a gleaming silver switch was flicked on the dash.

That meant that if the battery died, or the tiny electric engine coughed out, the fuel one would be there to kick in, roaring and proud. Of course, it would also be useful in the City, for stealth missions, because the electric would be almost silent, by the looks of it. The tiny engine was shiny and new, and Frank could barely resist removing the thing and looking at it from end to end. Instead, he replaced the siding, and walked out of the garage with a sigh. One day he’d get his hands on one of those top-end bikes. Thriller must have chased down a bike-riding Scarecrow, which were hard to come by, to get those parts.

Frank kicked a small stone on the ground. He was almost out of the garage when the door to the diner creaked on its hinges. Thriller’s voice wafted out, bemused.

“You should really fix that.”

Frank’s eyes darted to the side and he ducked out of sight in a thankfully empty cabinet, closing the flimsy door shut almost all the way seconds before Thriller and Kobra stepped into the garage.

Fuck. That had been pure instinct, and now he was going to be stuck in this dusty prison until Thriller had gone.

“You don’t have to leave.”

From his vantage point, Frank could see Thriller’s bike, and the two men approaching it. Kobra’s eyes were...he hadn’t ever seen the man like this. HIs voice was almost pleading, if Frank was reading it properly.

“You know I do.” Thriller ran his finger on the leather of his seat, body angled away from Kobra.

“The Rats know their stuff, Thrill. You can leave them alone for one night. Come on, you’ve practiced for this.”

“Yeah, for if I get _captured_ , Kid. Not for...”

“Not for what, Thriller? Some cheap trick?”

“That’s not...”

“It _is_. It is, and you know it. I’m stuck out here in this fucking desert with a little kid and three grown men, one of which I’m still not convinced is entirely grown up! And it’s...you, coming out here, us going in there, every fucking time, I...” Kobra’s chest was heaving, and he swiped a hand angrily across his face. “I can’t keep doing this.”

Thriller wouldn’t turn around. Frank could see his lips firming up into a thin line as his jaw clenched. “So come with me.” His voice was low, like he’d said this a hundred times.

Kobra made a sound at the back of his throat, somewhere between a sob and a growl, and clenched his hands up into fists. “You can’t ask me to do that, not now. Not after...we’re only out here to protect your stupid operation. Fuck.”

“You can’t come with me and I can’t leave,” Thriller muttered. “It’s the same as it always is.”

He turned around then, and pulled Kobra to him. Kobra was the taller of the two, but he melted into the embrace, burying his face in Thriller’s shoulder. Frank hadn’t ever seen Kobra so much as really smile for more than ten minutes, let alone this.

Finally, Kobra peeled himself off Thriller. His cheeks were slick with tears, and his eyes red and swollen. “I hate this,” he muttered.

“Me too,” Thriller said. “And it isn’t fair. But we, I don’t know. I can’t give you up. It would be easier if I could, if we both could.”

Kobra didn’t answer, just hugged his arms around his midsection.

Thriller nodded. “I’ll see you,” he said. He put on his helmet and kicked his bike into life, it must have been the electric engine doing that. The bike kicked up some dust but not much, and then he was gone, and Kobra was left behind.

Kobra heaved in a shaking breath and wiped a hand over his cheek. “Fuck,” he muttered, and then, “Okay, where are you hiding, you little shit?”

Frank frowned. Someone was hiding? Was it Party? No way could Jet Star hide with that hair of his.

“That was a rhetorical question,” Kobra said. His nose sounded a little stuffed, which, okay, he had just been crying. “I know you’re in the goddamn cabinet. You’re so fucking loud, I don’t know how you ever survived so long under BLI.”

Frank looked to his left. Nobody else was...oh. “I, uh,” he said, pushing the door open, “didn’t...see anything.”

The scowl looked much more at home on his face than the pleading person Frank had seen moments ago. “Fuck off, ‘Fun Ghoul’,” he snapped, tracing quotes in the air with his fingers.

Frank stepped out, wondering how close he could get to Kobra before the man shot him. “But I just, you know. If I had seen something, I’d want to say that it sucked. And that if I was in that situation, I wouldn’t be, like, strong enough to carry on or whatever. Just hypothetically.”

Kobra sniffed. “Eavesdropping is a shitty thing to do,” he muttered.

“It was a reflex,” Frank said. “I panicked.”

“What the fuck from, you moron? We’re not going to attack you out here.”

“Old habits.” Frank shrugged. “I won’t tell anyone if you won’t.”

Kobra turned his head away from Frank. “Whatever,” he muttered.

Frank bit his lip, and bounced on the balls of his feet. He felt like he should do something to make Kobra feel a bit better, though he doubted that anything short of physically dragging Thriller back would do the trick. On a whim, he surged forward, wrapping his arms around Kobra and squeezing tightly. He managed to hold on until he felt Kobra’s torso relax, and then he let go, smiling. “Sorry I’m such a shit,” he said.

Kobra wrinkled his nose. “If you don’t leave right now, I swear to god I’ll kill you.”

“And if I tell anyone, you’ll kill me. Blah blah, etcetera,” Frank said. “I get it. BLI can’t last forever, though.”

Kobra primed his flasher, and Frank decided that, yeah, he probably should get out of there. He couldn’t resist glancing back over his shoulder at the lone figure in the garage, staring off into the distance after a bike that he couldn’t even see.

_art by_

**Chapter 2**

The shelves were stocked from ceiling to floor with white cans and boxes. Frank pushed at the cart in front of him, meandering down the aisle until he got to the spot where he usually stopped. He took down two cans of smiling food, sighing down at the tin in his hands. This was always the dilemma, wasn’t it? Mushroom or vegetable soup.

He felt hands wrap around his midsection moments before a chin tucked over his shoulder. “Ghoul,” the voice whispered, tickling his ear as it went by. Frank sighed again, the cans in his hands.

“Can’t pick a soup,” he said, glancing to the side to see the red hair tucked behind a white ear. When he turned his head just a bit, the bridge of his nose brushed against Party Poison’s cheek.

Party’s eyes were bright. His mouth twisted to one side before his eyes crossed to meet Frank’s.

“You’re no help,” he muttered.

Party chuckled, and swooped forward to kiss Frank’s cheek. “Wake up,” he said.

Frank frowned. “Fuck off.”

“We don’t need soup,” Party said. He turned Frank around, and shook his shoulders. “Wake. Up!”

Frank dislodged the arm from his shoulder. “We _do_ ,” he said. “I have to buy soup, honey!” he shouted, pillow beneath his head and bed replacing shelves at his back. He sat up, eyes squinting in the bright light, sticky with sleep.

“Took you fucking long enough,” Party snapped.

Frank rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. It felt good and eased a bit of the tension in his shoulders. “What the fuck time is it?” he croaked, voice thick. It had to be early for him to feel this shitty.

“Don’t know, don’t care. Listen.”

Frank cracked his eyes open with some effort. Party was kneeling beside his bed, radio in his hands. “You woke me up to listen to the radio?”

“Listen, _honey_ ,” Party said, eyes narrowing. His mouth twitched at one edge.

Frank froze. He swallowed. “Uh.”

“Just,” Party snapped. “We can talk about your weird sexual fantasies later. Listen, okay?”

“They’re not,” Frank protested, but sighed. “Fine. Turn it up.”

Party swiveled the little volume knob. Static erupted from the radio, and he fiddled with the tuning dial, face focused in concentration.

“Ah,” he muttered.

The radio crackled again, and coughed. _“DAY...nel...compr...sed......re..advised...”_

“Cheap...fucking...” Party muttered, and smacked the back of the radio.

Dr. DeathDefying’s voice crackled through now, cutting past the static, clearly in the middle of a broadcast. He sounded slightly muted, as though he might be in a vehicle.

_“...have gone and taken a bigger bite than they could chew. Crows are circling about, ready to pick up every last crumb left behind. Drips be advised: they don’t look kindly on stragglers, and they’re drawn to bright, flashy things.”_

“That’s the end,” Party said. “He’ll start again, just wait.”

There was a pause. Frank sat up a bit straighter, worrying his lip between his teeth.

_“MAYDAY, MAYDAY. Tunnel Rats ahoy, this is your friendly neighbourhood Crow Watch in the early morning. Rats have been compromised. Breaking news: in a thrilling case of disappearances, chases and cheese, rats are no longer safe. Scurry off to your holes and hide it out. Red and redder are advised not to swoop in and sniff around like dogs. Hunker down in your bunkers, we’ve got the suckers coming at us from every angle, on the run, playin’ hide and seek for keeps and I aim to win. Don’t come lookin’ for any cheap tricks, don’t be a cheap trick comin’ and lookin’, stay nested and hold on to your horsepower. The rats have gone and taken a bigger bite than they could chew...”_

Frank looked at Party as Dr. Death continued with what they’d already listened to. “Rats like the Tunnel Rats?”

Party’s eyes were wide. “Compromised,” he said. “Just when Thriller said their security measures were up to par.”

“Have the others heard this? We should wake them up.”

“Dr. D said to sight tight,” Party said.

“Right,” Frank said, already pushing his covers off and looking for his boots. He slept in his pants, in case he ever had to take off without a moment’s notice.

“You get Jet,” Party said. “You have to duck when you wake Kobra up.”

Frank winced, remembering the time he’d tried to wake Kobra up. “Right,” he said, not bothering to do up his laces. Jet Star’s room was just down the hall from his, and he knocked once before slipping in. “Jet!” he shouted, as loudly as he could.

Jet rumbled something in his sleep, and pulled his blanket closer to his face.

“Wake up, it’s the Rats,” Frank said, reaching over to shove Jet’s shoulder.

Jet blinked sleepily up at him. “Tunnel Rats?” he croaked. He shoved himself into a sitting position and rubbed his eyes. “What the fuck time is it?”

Frank shrugged. “Tunnel Rats smashed into some Crows’ what I heard. And I dunno, Party wouldn’t tell me.”

“Probably has fucking insomnia again,” Jet groaned. “I’m up, you can stop dancing around.”

“It’s my natural state.” Frank blinked. “I can’t help it.”

“It’s probably four,” Jet said. He heaved himself out of bed, feet landing in boots he’d placed strategically over the edge. “Party getting Kobra up?”

Something smashed before a door slammed. “I’d say he’s up,” Frank said. Party stomped past their room growling, holding an ice pack to his head on his way into the dining room, most likely.

A door slammed again, and Kobra slouched past the open door to Jet’s room, shoulders hunched and eyes squinted. His hands were balled up into fists at his sides.

“Yep,” Jet said. “He’s up alright. Let’s go before they kill each other out there.”

“Or we could wait until after,” Frank said. “Then there’d only be one to deal with.”

“Either one of them could kill us in their sleep,” Jet said. “Our odds aren’t very good.”

“I think I might talk in my sleep,” Frank blurted, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “You don’t.”

Jet looked at him, and then started walking. “Definitely leaving now,” he muttered.

Frank followed him, and together they walked into the diner. Kobra and Party were sitting across from each other, both men glowering. “Hurry the fuck up,” Kobra snapped. 

Party was fiddling with the dial again. Frank slipped in beside him because his early morning jittering would probably annoy Kobra, so it was safer to be on this side of the table. “Thought we had the channel already,” he said.

“He keeps changing it,” Party muttered. “For safety and so he can get the most amount of people to hear him.”

Jet raised an eyebrow at Frank, but watched the radio in silence. They all leaned closer when Dr. D’s voice crackled through. It was all the same stuff he’d said the last time, but at the end, instead of cutting into static, he cleared his throat. _“Update from one of the runners says that the chase has hit a dead end, but they’ll keep scurryin’ for clues. Don’t move, motorbabies.”_

The radio crackled, and suddenly there was only static. The Doctor had moved on, switching channels.

“Rats like the Tunnel Rats?” Jet asked.

“Fuck,” Kobra muttered.

Party had been about to nod, Frank could see the muscles in his neck twitching with the aborted movement. “What?”

Kobra’s eyes were wide, staring down at his hands, clenched together on the tabletop. Frank had been too busy watching the radio and listening for any changes to notice that Kobra’s knuckles were white and shaking. The man swallowed, and looked up at Party. “They have Thriller,” he breathed. “Scarecrow...they have him.”

Party frowned. “Are you sure?”

“Didn’t you hear?” Kobra pointed to the silent radio. “A thrilling case of disappearances, red and redder, che...compromised?”

 _Cheap trick_ , Frank thought. That was what Kobra had been about to say. “But,” he said, “what if it’s not...”

“Shut the fuck up, Ghoul. Ge...” he licked his lips. “Party. We have to go. We have to go find him.”

Party looked unsure. “The Crows are circling though, Kobra. We have to stay here. Until we know what’s happening.”

Kobra slammed his fist on the table. “If you fuckwads won’t come, then I’ll go alone.”

“No,” Party said. He leaned forward. “You’re staying right here.”

Kobra stood up as much as he could within the restrictions of the booth. “I can’t!” he shouted. “I can’t stay here and do nothing. I have. To. Go.”

Party’s face twisted, and he’d stood, primed, and drawn his gun before Kobra could charge his own. “Sit the fuck down, Kobra,” he said.

Kobra ground his teeth together. “You won’t shoot me,” he growled. “Get that thing out of my fucking face.”

“Sit,” Party said, “down. Or I _will_ knock you out.”

Kobra’s eyes were livid, spitting venom like the snake he’d been named after, but he slowly sat down.

“Good,” Party growled. “Nobody’s leaving until we get the all clear.”

“I’ll wait,” Kobra muttered, when Party had sheathed his gun, “but not for long.”

Jet Star started in his seat, and quickly got out. Kobra slid out and walked away as quickly as he could. When Jet sat back down, he looked guilty and uncomfortable. Frank felt like he should say something to lighten the mood.

“Ghoul called me honey,” Party said, before Frank even had the chance to open his mouth.

“Really,” Jet said, raising an eyebrow.

“It was a dream!” Frank said, folding his arms across his chest. “I didn’t call _you_ honey, I called...my...wife...that.”

“You had a dream where you were married to Party Poison?” Jet asked, a smile stretching his big lips. “That’s fucked up.”

“Daddy?”

“Grace?” Jet said, leaning out. “Hey, baby. Did we wake you up?”

Grace shuffled over, clutching a large robot doll to her chest. She nodded sleepily, and climbed up into Jet’s lap, still wearing her pyjamas. “What’s happening?”

“Nothing,” Jet murmured, smoothing the hair on her head. “Just talking about a dream Ghoul had where he and Party were married.”

Grace leaned back. “I thought you said the supermarket dream was a secret,” she said.

A silence followed her comment in which Frank froze. He could feel Party Poison twisting to face him and see Jet Star’s eyes widening in front of him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

“This is a recurring dream?” Party asked.

Jet Star just laughed, loudly and brightly.

“A _supermarket_?” Party asked again, leaning closer to Frank, who shrunk into his own clothes as much as he could. “What are we buying, honey? Soup?”

“Yes,” he said. And then, he stood up. “Stop laughing! It isn’t funny! I hate all of you, every last one,” he snapped, finger pointing at each of them. Even Grace was grinning, so he pointed at her too. “Stop it! It isn’t...I don’t...” He threw his arms up, and stomped away. “I’m going back to bed.”

He tried to walk away as quickly as possible, but couldn’t quite escape the laughter and shouts of “Pick me out some cream of mushroom, would you?” that followed him until he was tucked deep into bed.

* * * *

Kobra managed to keep himself busy and quiet for a good two days after the broadcast had come through. He stuck to the shadowy corners of the diner, all the little places where he’d stashed his tech supplies. Frank barely saw him. Jet and Grace were visibly around, practicing shooting and cleaning the bits of the diner that they could.

“This place,” Grace informed him, tiny hands on her tiny hips, “is filthy. You boys always seem to leave messes everywhere. I tell you, Ghoul, it’s in a right state, it is.”

Frank watched her prowl about the room, shaking her head at “the state of things” and “howdy do, that’s a big pile of sand, can’t you clean up after yourself”. “Sorry?” he said. “We could clean it up now, we’re going to be stuck here for a few days anyway.”

“We could,” she muttered, “if we had any cleaning supplies.”

“Found some,” Jet announced from the doorway. “Looks like we can clean...our eating table, and the food counter. Bathroom too. I don’t know if we should clean the floor in here, though. Maybe do a quick sweep? We don’t want it to look lived in or anything.”

“Daddy,” Grace squealed, and threw her arms around him. “You’re the best. Can we play Western after this?”

“Of course we can,” Jet said, beaming as his daughter ran around with a bottle of cleaner and a cloth. He watched her go, scrubbing at the surface of the table they always sat at.

“Does this mean I have to help?” Frank asked.

“Yep,” Jet Star proclaimed cheerfully. “I brought three cloths. Look at her go.”

“All grown up,” Frank muttered, accepting the cloth.

“She’s been listening to the weird things Dr. D puts on the radio, that’s where her new vocabulary is from.” Jet sprayed the surface of the counter and they both cleaned until it was gleaming.

Poison came in when they were almost done, and his nose wrinkled at the sight. “Eugh,” he said. “You’re _cleaning_?”

“If we’re going to be stuck here,” Frank said, looking up from the counter that he was ridiculously proud of, “you’d might as well take a shower.”

“Are you crazy?” Poison spluttered. “I’d rather sell my plasma in A. It’s bad for your skin, soap. Anyway, I don’t need it.”

“You go outside every day and bake inside a leather jacket with no ventilation,” Frank said. “You don’t even undo the zip. You need it.”

Poison scowled. “If anyone needs a shower, it’s _you_. Wash all that smugness right off your face.”

Frank rolled his eyes. “Really great comeback. See if you can’t find some more of those in that greasetrap you call a head.”

“I...” Poison’s hand twitched at his side, and he ground his teeth together before stomping out of the room. A door (probably his) slammed.

Jet Star looked up at Frank, impressed. “That was good,” he said.

Frank shrugged. “If he does it.” He pulled his cloth away, and beamed at the sparkling counter. “Beautiful,” he said, just as a second door slammed and the sound of the bathroom sink running poured down the hallway.

Jet Star clapped Frank on the back. “You deserve an award,” he said. “Grace! Set up the shooting range!”

“Hey,” Frank said, as Jet moved to follow Grace out of the diner, “any idea where Kobra is?”

“No.”

“It’s been two days since I’ve seen him,” Frank said.

“So go find him,” Jet said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some coyotes that need rustl’in.”

Frank let him go. Kobra clearly wasn’t in the dining part of the diner, nor was he in either Frank, Jet, or Grace’s rooms. He glanced curiously at the bathroom as he walked past it to get to the garage. The Trans AM was slumbering peacefully in the middle, and there was no sign of Kobra in any of the corners or cupboards. He wandered outside, checked all of the closets, and ended up in front of Kobra’s room.

It was perhaps the most logical place to look for Kobra, but it was also the one place Frank was afraid to check. He hesitated in front of the door a moment, and then rapped on the wood. “Hello?”

From his vantage point, with his ear pressed up to the door, he could hear the sound of metal being tossed onto metal. “Kobra?” he asked again.

“Go away,” Kobra said, from inside.

“Grace and Jet are shooting some cans in the back, pretending to be cowboys.”

“Don’t want to,” Kobra yelled back.

Frank frowned. “If you don’t open this door up, I’m going to knock it down.”

Kobra snarled something indecipherable, and Frank leaned back seconds before the door swung open. “What the _fuck_ could you possibly want?”

His eyes were bloodshot, his hair on end, and his face almost gray. “I just wanted to see how you were doing,” Frank muttered. “You should eat. And have a shower. Party Poison’s doing it, it’s all the rage.”

Kobra looked him up and down. “Fuck off,” he sneered.

“No,” Frank said. “You haven’t been out of your room in two days. Come on, what are you doing?”

Kobra folded his arms across his chest. “Building something that’ll keep out nosy little motherfuckers who should know better than to meddle in other peoples’ private businesses.”

“Yeah?” Frank asked. “So you’re cloning yourself, that’s cool. I heard that took a long time, but whatever, you’re the genius.”

Frank barely had time to stick his boot out before Kobra slammed the door on it. “Wait, I’m not done talking to you!”

“I just,” Kobra seethed, “want to be left _alone_. How hard is that to understand? Are you some kind of idiot, Fun Ghoul? Do you not hear the words coming out of my mouth? Can you not understand English? You’re as dumb as a Drac.”

“I’m bored,” Frank said. “And I want to see what you’re doing. So are you going to let me, or am I just going to stand here with my foot in your doorway all day?”

“Stand there all the fuck you want,” Kobra said. “I could give less than a shit about it.”

“That’s not true,” Frank said. “You give at least three shits, come on, let’s be fair. Look, you can talk to me, I’m very good at listening. I’ll sit still and everything, promise.”

“Talk to you about what?” Kobra asked, raising an eyebrow. “Soup?”

Frank froze. “Um. No, why would you say that?”

“You go about having dreams that include our illustriously fearless leader, the news is going to travel pretty quickly. I mean, we all live in the same area.”

“I didn’t,” Frank said, “fuck, why does everybody keep talking about that?”

Kobra shrugged. He’d left the door where it was, and was hunched over something on his desk. “It’s fuckin’ funny, that’s why. You and your weirdly domestic little imagination. Wait, let me guess? You’ve also had dreams about baking him supper and looking for china patterns?”

Frank looked up to the ceiling. “Not...the baking one...exactly.”

“Gross,” Kobra muttered. “You’re the weirdest little guy, you know that?”

“I’m not that weird,” Frank muttered. “Don’t tell me you never dream about Thriller.”

Kobra stiffened on his bench, and slowly turned around. “Thriller’s not...I. We’re not. We don’t work together. And I haven’t. I haven’t had dreams where I’m picking out goddamn _soup_ for him.”

Frank shrugged. “We do too work together, the Tunnel Rats are, like. I don’t know, Dr. D’s favourite pet project. And we’re like, their subsidiary.”

“That’s not what that word means.”

“You know what I mean though,” Frank said. “Anyway, it’s the same, and you know it.”

“It isn’t the same,” Kobra snapped. “Want to know why, Ghoul? Because we don’t _live_ with Thriller. We aren’t around each other all the damn time. You live with someone for this long, you get to be like family with them, and _that’s_ why it’s different.”

Frank worried at his lower lip. “But you wish you did live with him.”

Kobra got up and marched across the room. “I don’t,” he said. “I don’t and I never will. Thriller’s just, he isn’t anything to me. He’s a good friend, that’s all. I don’t wish I lived with him, and I don’t wish that I could be picking out fucking china patterns with him.”

“You do,” Frank said, stepping forward to meet Kobra halfway. “And it sucks. That you have to be away from him all the time. Always in danger. Never knowing if he’s going to come back, or if you’re going to get back. And anyway, china’s nice. Pretty. It’s not wrong to want nice things.”

Something dark flashed behind Kobra’s eyes. “We can’t have nice things,” he muttered. “We never can.”

“We cleaned the food counter,” Frank said. “That’s nice. What you’re making looks nice. Maybe. I can’t actually see it. But, I mean, I imagine.”

“It’s just a glove,” Kobra muttered. He turned his back to Frank and walked back over to the desk. “Get out now.”

“What?”

“I said leave,” Kobra said. “Now.”

“You’re _allowed_ to say please, you know,” Frank said.

“Please leave so I don’t have to shoot you,” Kobra snapped.

Well, it was a step. Frank closed Kobra’s door behind him, pulling it extra hard so it would click shut. There was something that Kobra wasn’t telling him. A lot of things in general, but something about Thriller. He’d seen it in his eyes, in the little twitches of his hands, in the curve of his back. He tapped his finger on the shiny knob of the door thoughtfully.

“Hello there.”

“Mother,” Frank said, jumping and twirling around. “Of fucking shit, Party.”

The second Frank had started, Party had somehow moved so that he was barely an inch away. As a result, Frank lost his balance a little in the move, and ended up on his back on the dirty floor of the hallway. From this angle, Party looked very intimidating. His red hair was hanging down the sides of his face, somehow even brighter than it had been before. Water was dripping down it, and when he moved so that he was standing above Frank, leaning on his thighs, the droplets of water hanging on the ends of his hair fell right on his face.

“All clean now,” Party said, grinning with his gleaming, small teeth.

Frank swallowed. He’d managed to prop himself up before Party had loomed over him, but he was staring right up into those shining eyes, blinking water away from his. “I can see that,” he said, his excellent comeback squeaking a bit at the end.

“Aw, Ghoul.” Party pouted. “Getting wet now, are you?”

“Uh,” Frank managed. His throat seemed to be shrinking.

Party leaned a bit closer. His thighs must be very strong, not that Frank was thinking about or looking at his thighs. Or arms. Or the pulse he could see in Party’s neck because he was very close. The ends of Party’s hair tickled Frank’s face. “You should take a shower,” Party breathed. “Great idea, Ghoul. I should take your advice more often, probably. Now, what was it that you said the other day?”

Frank couldn’t remember ever having spoken a word in his life. And for the life of him, he couldn’t remember how he’d gotten a case of the dust mouth so bad that it should be illegal.

“Right,” Poison said. His hair was _really_ soft when it was clean. And wet. And sticking to Frank’s face. “You told me we should be off in the supermarkets of Battery City, buying soup. I’m curious,” he said. He leaned closer and Frank shrank down towards the ground, mirroring Party’s movements until his head touched linoleum and he couldn’t get any further away from the deranged clown. Party’s tongue darted out to wet his lips, and he grinned. “What else do we do in these dreams of yours, Ghoul?”

“Uu-uh,” Frank choked, eyes wide.

Party tsked under his breath. “No witty retort? I’m disappointed.” His eyelashes, when had his eyelashes gotten that long? And when had he started making breathy sighs that send fizzy, tingling nerves down to Frank’s toes? “Guess you’re not quite the husband I thought you’d be.”

He straightened up slowly, swiveling his hips and cracking his back before he walked off towards his room. He left Frank behind, on the floor, yearning spreading from the soles of his feet to the hands he pressed to his eyes. He was so, so terribly fucked over in almost every sense of the word except for the one he wanted most of all.

* * * *

Another broadcast didn’t come for another two days, after they’d cleaned every stretch of the diner that was hidden from any prowling intruders, and exhausted every game that Grace could think up, after they’d had too many long naps and Kobra had updated all of their ray guns at least twice. They were all around the booth when Grace found it amidst the crackle of static: the sure, easy voice of Dr. DeathDefying.

 _“Hel_ lo _my little army of carburetors and ink jet printers. I trust you’re all doing well, getting your nine to fives and lots of good powernaps in there. We’ve got an update, flown in to our current location via pirate moths. Can’t say for sure on the front of thrilling escapades, but trickles say that there’s a mostly secure, mostly brightwhitebang location where some questionably legal activities are going down. Word on the street is that the City’s in lockdown and the tunnels are stoppered up from head to ratty toe. Keep your pants on, goblins, we’ve got a long ride ahead of us before anybody’s getting back in. Stay nested, and keep smashing those heads and pills.”_

The voice crackled out. Everyone had leaned forward, ears tilted towards the small radio, and when it finished, shoulders slumped all around. “Tunnels stoppered up?” Party groaned. “BLI must be watching them like a hawk. Fuck.”

“There aren’t any other ways into the City,” Jet said, despairingly.

“Secure location,” Kobra muttered. “They have him in a secure location and they’re torturing him.”

Frank exchanged looks with Grace across the table. She slid out underneath it, and popped out on the other side. “What’re we gonna do?” she asked. Jet was on the outside of the table, and he shook his head.

The loud sirens, low to high, blasted through the diner, loud and clear. Grace clapped her hands over her ears and ran off to hide all evidence that humans had ever lived here. Kobra jostled Jet out of the way and did the same: he could make his room look empty in seconds flat. Frank went, too, but he didn’t actually have any things in his room aside from his bed. It was easy enough to mask: they’d built it where a counter used to be, and his bed just swiveled around and became the counter thanks to a thing that Kobra had rigged up. Aside from that, he just pushed some dust around on the floor, and met the others in the hall.

They weren’t usually in the diner when the Dracs came a-calling, so they decided to hide in the bathroom. A car door slammed near the garage.

Frank was closest to the door, crouched down on the ground. Party was right above him, and Frank heard him swallow. “The garage,” he whispered. “The car’s in the garage.”

Frank’s eyes widened, and he looked up at Party’s white face. Hiding their stuff wouldn’t matter if the car was there. The Dracs would know. They weren’t the sharpest bullets in BLI’s gun, but they weren’t completely dumb.

“Fuck,” Frank breathed.

Kobra sniffed. “We’ll have to kill ‘em,” he whispered.

Party nodded. All four of them drew their flashers. With his gun humming in his hands, he felt a lot better. Even without knowing how many Dracs there were, or whether their weapons were primed or not.

Frank eased open the door. No Dracs up ahead. He checked down both sides of the hall, and slipped out. He’d take the diner, since he was the first one out. There was only one in the room, and he shot it in the back of the head before it had the chance to turn around or call for backup. He heard two more thumps from their rooms, and turned around. Jet backed up, gun still in his hands. “How many did they send?” he asked Frank.

Frank shrugged. “I only got one.”

“One in my room,” Kobra said.

“One in the garage,” Party added. “I think that’s it. He didn’t call or anything, he was just staring at the car.”

“We can’t use the tunnels,” Kobra said, suddenly. “Right?”

“That’s what D said,” Frank said, tucking his gun into its holster.

Kobra flexed his hands at his sides. “What if we went in the front?”

“They’d catch us,” Jet said. “They’ve got the same face rec we’ve got. Probably better.”

“What if,” Kobra said, “It wasn’t us?”

“What, like clones?” Frank frowned. “You said you weren’t cloning.”

“You’re cloning?” Party asked. “That’s weird.”

“No, I’m not,” Kobra said. “Just, just listen. We have four Dracs here. Four dead Dracs.”

“Right,” Party said.

“And there are four of us,” Kobra said. “And the Dracs are dead. And they don’t need their clothes.”

“I don’t think sex is really an option right now,” Frank said.

“No, god,” Kobra snapped. “Jet Star, come on. You taught the Dracs for a long time. You can probably speak their language, right?”

Jet shrugged. “Maybe.”

“And you know what motions are vaguely acceptable to a Drac?”

“No,” Jet said. “No, no. I don’t like that. I am not going to dress up like a Drac, Kobra.”

“Ew,” Frank muttered. “They’re probably smelly.”

“Look, it’s the only way we’re going to get in,” Kobra said. “Come on.”

“We don’t even know that Thriller’s in the city,” Party said. “He could be anywhere. This could be one giant trap.”

“I’m going in,” Kobra said. “If you don’t want to follow me, you don’t have to. But I’ve waited long enough, P. I’m leaving.” He retreated into his room, presumably to undress the Drac lying smoking on his floor. “And if you want to come, I’d suggest that you get dressed fast.”

Party watched Kobra go, and immediately disappeared into the garage without a second thought. Frank wrung his hands in front of him. “I don’t like this,” he said.

Jet Star shook his head. “Me neither. But we’re Killjoys, aren’t we? The four of us?” He nodded to Frank, and then went to strip his own Drac.

Frank faced the dead man on the floor and swallowed. This...this did not bode well.

**Chapter 3**

Frank finished rolling up the legs of his starchy, white pants. Party Poison had insisted that they pull the Drac outfits on while still keeping their regular clothes on underneath, for when they ditched the ugly white suits. The shirt was tight around his throat but went up high enough so that his tattoos were completely hidden when he pulled the mask down.

Party came out of the diner, mask under his arm. Frank straightened up as the man approached the Trans AM that he was leaning up against. Jet Star was already in the car.

“Sometimes I forget how fuckin’ short you are,” Party said, grinning.

Frank scowled. “Shut up,” he muttered, rolling up the sleeves of his white suit jacket before pulling it on. He was already wearing the gloves, and his boots were black so he’d decided not to change them. “Nobody looks good in Drac white.”

“Speak for yourself.” Poison sniffed. “I’m hot. Don’t know why you would say I’m not. Look, the white makes it look like I have a tan.”

A crackly buzz from the car made both men glance over.

Jet Star was looking up at the radio, eyes wide.

“What’s that?” Party asked.

“Backup,” Jet Star said. “It’s the first stage. They call for a response, and then they call for a status report. If either of those aren’t answered quickly enough...”

“Answer it,” Frank said.

“Yeah,” Party said. “You should sit in the front. Give them a status report.”

Party looked like he had a tan, but Jet Star was white as a sheet. Kobra stomped out of the diner just as Frank was doing up his seatbelt per BLI Protocol. “Get in,” Party said, starting up the white car.

“Masks on,” Jet mumbled, from beneath the white plastic.

Frank looked down at his mask. Just touching the disgusting rubber was sending shivers up and down his spine. Fuck. He patted his pocket, checking for his bandana, and then pulled on the mask, making sure it was secure around his head. Party Poison was already wearing his, and the car was in motion before Kobra pulled his mask on.

The radio buzzed again. Jet took a deep breath and pressed one black button that looked like every single other black button on the radio.

Static cracked through, and then a monotonous voice gargling something that Frank couldn’t quite catch.

Jet Star held down a different black button after he cleared his throat. “Mrkhgh nr lmmg hnngh tchk ckck hm,” he gargled, in a near-perfect imitation of a Drac.

The radio buzzed, and then a voice answered, “Rch gll.”

Jet Star clicked a third black button and slumped back in his chair. “Fuck,” he said. “Didn’t think that would work.”

“Fuckin’ creepy, dude,” Kobra muttered.

“I’m glad we have you,” Party said. “We wouldn’t have even known anything about their creepy pseudo-language thing if it weren’t for you.”

Frank saw Jet’s head twitch to the side before returning to its forward-facing position. “At least someone is.”

“I’m serious,” Party said. “You’re a great Killjoy, Jet. Doesn’t matter what you did before, you’re with us now.”

Frank tapped the white gun at his side, fingers itching for the familiar green of Fun Ghoul. “What I want to know is if we can trick Dracs into thinking we’re normal even if we’re all dressed up in colour.”

“They respond mainly to body language,” Jet said. “That’s their primary clue. They give you a verbal warning, and if your body doesn’t look like what’s programmed as normal in their head, then they take you out or take you in. Same with Crows, but they’re a bit smarter.”

“So even if we’re dressed up like us, if we have deadbrain citizen body language, they’ll be confused enough not to call for backup?”

Frank looked at Party, whose fingers were drumming out an imagined beat on the steering wheel.

Jet shifted in his seat. “Maybe. I wasn’t in the testing department, so I don’t know how much work they’ve done on that front.”

“What’s normal?” Frank asked. “What’s something that would tip their brain back into colour-bad-shoot mode?”

“Anything...that looks like you aren’t asleep, I guess. That’s what the pills do, right, they dull all your senses, but the motor skills especially. Citizens don’t move around a lot, but if they do, they’re...well, we have some abnormal gestures that we let in. Like BLI wants people to reproduce, so if they look like they’re heading towards that, but aren’t doing anything too crazy, they’ll let it be. That’s about it, though, because it never even occurs to citizens that they should or could be doing anything else with their bodies or minds.”

“Don’t walk with a spring in your step is what you’re saying,” Party said.

Jet nodded. “Hunched shoulders are good. Heavy, really even steps, not looking at things that move around. Not even noticing the Dracs, actually. You won’t fool any Crows: they’ve got the skills that our face rec tech has, and they’re kind of like, they can learn, I guess? But if you walk right by Dracs like a kind of defeated, dull, sleeping person, I don’t know if it would fool ‘em, but it might. Sit up straight though, when we come into the City you need to look like you’ve got a stick for a spine and no brain in your head to tell your shoulders it might be more comfortable to slouch.”

Frank sighed. The mask was already making his forehead drip sweat into his eyes, and his chest felt pinned down by the awkwardly constructed suit jacket. Sitting up straight for three hours was going to give him hellish back cramps. But out of the corner of his mask’s eyehole he could see Kobra Kid sitting up, ramrod straight, and he felt a stab of guilt. He tried to picture himself in Kid’s position, but couldn’t imagine a life where Party Poison wasn’t at the wheel of the car, Jet Star wasn’t checking and re-checking his weapon, and Kobra Kid wasn’t making snarky comments about Frank’s smart ass. He didn’t know if they would work as a gang if it wasn’t the four of them, if Dr. D wasn’t out there, keeping an eye out on the Zones for the rest of them, and if Thriller wasn’t back in the City, taking it down stone by dull grey stone.

He straightened up and looked out the window. This was going to be a hell of a long car ride. But if they could get Thriller back, he’d do it a hundred times over again.

* * * *

The second they were underground, Frank peeled off his mask and threw it on the damp floor of the tunnel.

“No wonder those guys are dead inside,” he said, wiping his face with his bandana. His hair was stuck to his face where the deadly combination of desert sun and the sauna created by the mask had made his face a swimming pool. “You’d have to be to wear those shitty masks all day long.”

Jet laughed. He tossed his mask onto the growing pile, and unbuttoned his suit jacket. “They probably aren’t that bad if you’re only wearing one layer of clothes instead of three. Fuckin’ glad I don’t wear leather.”

Party Poison dropped off the ladder that led to the surface, and stripped his mask off with gusto. “I’m going to take down BLI and make them _swear_ not to make anyone wear those masks ever again. Goddamn fucking shit pieces of plastic. At least your rebreather’s got an air zone in it for proper ventilation as well as identity masking. Mother of _fuck_. I’d rather sniff nitros than be in one of those for another hour.”

Kobra was the last down, taking the time to close the manhole above them before he clambered down the ladder. His face was dripping with sweat under the mask, but his mouth was set in a grim line. He tossed his mask on the pile and wiped his forehead with the white jacket that he also discarded. “What’s the plan?” he asked, deftly removing his clothes.

“If they’re patrolling the tunnels, then we’re going to want to hide these,” Party said, the slight twinkle in his eyes disappearing as Kobra nodded, face stoic. “If what Dr. D said is true, then they’re holding Thriller in Ten.”

Frank frowned, checking his blaster and strapping it in under his arm. “How’d you figure that?”

“The bang part of the brightwhitebang,” Poison said. His eyes darted to Kobra, who was running a hand through his hair. “And Dr. D said something about powernaps, so it’ll be Ten that he was talking about. One of the ‘Thrusts with tiny backrooms in it, not meant for sleeping in or rehabilitation, but for casual dropins.”

“One of the older ones, too,” Jet said. “Two ways we can come at it, should we split or go four-in-one?”

“Split,” Party said. “I’ll take Ghoul, we’ll go down the front.”

“And if it’s a trap?” Ghoul asked.

Party shrugged. “Maybe we’ll find the Rats and one of them can tell us not to go any closer.”

Jet stuck his hand out. “See you on the other side,” he said, shaking first Party’s and then Frank’s hand before he stalked off down the corridor, gun in hand. Kobra hesitated for a second, doing his impression of a telepath to Party, who apparently understood and gave Kobra a quick hug. The most emotion Frank had ever seen passing over Kobra’s face was gone as quickly as the hug, and he simply punched Frank on the arm before he jogged after Jet down the corridor.

Frank grimaced. “He always does that,” he muttered, rubbing his arm. “I’m going to have a permanent dent in my arm one of these days.”

Party Poison was shoving the outfits as close to the wall as he could. Frank sniffed, and primed his flasher. “Let’s go,” he said, heading off in the direction of the front entrance to Ten. He stuck with his back to the wall, which made for slow going but it was always better to be slow and alive than fast and dead. The tunnels were like a labyrinth if you didn’t know where to go, but Frank had been running through them for years before he became a Killjoy.

He kept his eyes facing forward, and stopped at the first corner. This was where Kobra and Jet had probably turned, and there weren’t any Crows to be seen. Some thermal-mapping glasses would be useful right about now. In these tunnels, any point of heat was sure to turn up red on black.

The heavy sound of Party’s breathing was close to him now, closer than the _drip-drip-drip_ of water on the walls. It had been explained to him once that BL/Ind kept water dripping through the tunnels so the walls wouldn’t crack from being perpetually dry. That was probably a myth though, because BLI wouldn’t underestimate the power that dripping water had on rock, right?

“Wish we had thermal glasses,” Party hissed into Frank’s ear.

Frank swatted at the man, nose wrinkling. “Tickles,” he muttered. “Don’t.”

They moved on, slowly advancing towards the next intersection. The only sounds he could hear were their soft footsteps and the steady drip of water, but that didn’t mean that Crows weren’t patrolling. Their boots were made for stealth, so when he inched his face closer to the edge of the wall, he held his breath.

Empty.

He exhaled, and bypassed the corridor, moving forward still. Luckily, this path to Ten was mostly three way streets, so they didn’t have to worry about checking either side of them before scurrying on.

As they approached the next intersect, Frank could feel Party slowly getting closer until the man’s nose was brushing the top of his ear. “Stop,” Frank whispered, checking to see if it was clear. “I mean it.”

“Or you’ll what?” Party whispered back. “Run back to BLI?”

Frank jerked around. The tunnel was clear, so he didn’t even bother inching back. “What?” he asked, rubbing his ear where Party’s nose had been tickling it.

“I said,” Party said, face calm and serious, “Are you going to scurry back to BLI with all the information that you’ve learned?”

Where the hell was this coming from? “I’m not...I’ve never...What?”

Party pulled his gun out of its holster, and examined the tip before charging it. “Why do you know so much about the pills, Ghoul?”

It was scary, how quiet and calm his voice was. His eyes met Frank’s, and Frank couldn’t see anything there. No real curiosity, no spark of creativity, just a simmering nothingness. Frank swallowed and stepped away. He recognized this face: it was the one Party got when he was about to ghost a Drac. “I j-just...are you sure this is the best time to talk about this? I m-mean, what about Thrill-”

Party sniffed, and leveled the gun at Frank. “Answer me or I start shooting.”

Frank stepped back again, his heart picking up speed. His muscles were tensing up, knees loosening as his body tried to switch into flight mode. It was instinctive, but he tried to keep his breathing calm. His lips were dry, so he darted out his tongue to wet them. “I’m not with BLI,” he said, hands up in a defensive gesture. “Party Poison, I’m _not_. I don’t...I can’t...be with them.”

Party’s lips pursed together. His arm was steady, and his eyes fixed and hard on Frank’s. “Prove it,” he said.

Something made Frank’s head twitch to the side. “I can’t,” he said. “But I’m with you. Can’t you trust me?”

“Not if it’s going to get me or my br--brethren killed,” Party said.

Frank held up a finger. “Is that. Can you hear that?”

“All I hear is the whining of a desperate liar,” Party muttered.

“Footsteps,” Frank muttered. “Get back.” He was already swiveled back around, stepping closer to the wall. Party’s flasher hit between his shoulder blades but he shrugged it off so he could retreat to safety. Party wasn’t talking anymore, was gloriously silent as Frank peered around the corner. The tunnel they’d been about to cross was one that curved and ran parallel to the one they were in now. The _clump_ of boots approaching was unmistakable now.

“Dracs,” Frank hissed.

He straightened up and stepped back again, so he’d be farther away from the edge. If they were coming this way, they’d see them. It had sounded like...he tilted his head to the side, and counted. One, two, three Dracs walking in near-perfect unison. They weren’t very good at the whole synchronization thing.

“What do we do?” Party whispered. His mouth was right at Frank’s ear again.

They looked very suspicious, hanging out in the dark tunnels that citizens didn’t even know about, dressed in bright reds and yellows and blues. All of the fucking primary colours. “Shit,” Frank muttered. Hunched shoulders? That wouldn’t work with bright ray guns in their hands. Dead eyes wouldn’t work if it was just too dark for the Dracs to see specific details about them.

“Jet said,” Party whispered, as the footsteps got closer.

Frank’s heart hadn’t climbed down from the speed it had picked up earlier, and his brain was firing as quickly as it could. “God,” Frank muttered, “ _damn_. Run with it and shoot ‘em,” he whispered, shoving his flasher into its sheath and moving Party’s gun from his right hand to his left so it would be hidden from the oncoming Dracs.

“What are you,” Party said, his mind pulling pieces together just quickly enough for him to be able to say it before Frank had him pressed up against the wall.

Frank had closed his eyes before he’d moved, because he didn’t really want to see if Party was looking at him in complete disgust while they kissed. Jet’s words had flashed through his mind, _“BLI wants people to reproduce”_ just in time. He could vaguely hear, in the background, the loud boots slowing to a halt. He tried to concentrate on listening to what the Dracs were doing, to the gargles they were exchanging, tried his absolute _hardest_ not to think about the way Party’s mind seemed to have clicked as soon as Frank’s lips had met his own, the way the mouth beneath his was moving.

Frank tried, he really did, not to think about Party’s hand in his hair, or the way that his tongue had deftly swiped past Frank’s own lips, but it was getting really difficult. The steps behind him had stopped completely, and Frank grabbed a hold of one of Party’s hips in order to distract himself from the idea that the Dracs could be priming their flashers right now. At least he’d go out with a bang.

Someone let out a soft moan, and as Frank panted into Party’s mouth, he realized that it had been _him_. His hands were moving of their own accord now, because he’d suddenly realized that if he died right here, he wouldn’t have _ever_ gotten to touch Party’s skin. The way his toes were curling in his boots from the older man’s tongue tracing patterns inside his mouth, and the way that he couldn’t quite breathe properly reminded his brain that _this_ was what he’d been missing for his entire life. _This._

Party’s hips moved, suddenly, and he adjusted his stance, somehow moving Frank’s legs apart using his knee in the process. Frank forgot, when Party’s pelvis ground against his, what, exactly, they were supposed to be doing. When boots squeaked in the background and the warm, hard plastic of Party’s ray gun brushed the strip of skin created when his shirt had rode up a bit brought his mind and heart crashing back to the damp floors of the tunnels.

This wasn’t real.

Frank let go of Party’s mouth, ignoring the way the face beneath him followed his with a noise of protest, and moved his mouth to Party’s ear. “Shoot,” he whispered, before taking the opportunity to trace his own tongue on a soft spot of skin just beneath Party’s earlobe. Party’s body arched up into his, and the man groaned, hot breath catching along the side of Frank’s temple.

“Don’t stop,” Party panted.

Frank could still feel Party’s gun at his side. His mouth stilled for a moment, and he just breathed into the Killjoy’s skin. Was...did Party not know? Did he think...was he enjoying this just as much as Frank was? “ _Shoot_ ,” he hissed, desperate.

He could feel Party swallowing at this distance, imagined he could hear the beating of the man’s heart. The hand in his hair suddenly pushed down. Party’s movement was so fast that if Frank hadn’t noticed the absence of the gun at his side, he would have completely missed the three shots.

Frank pushed away from the wall, away from Party Poison as the last body thumped to the floor. His mouth felt almost swollen, and he licked his lips a few times, trying to hold onto the lingering remnants of Party’s taste.

When he looked back, Party Poison was still panting, but he’d pulled his mouth shut and was breathing through his nose. The shield he’d brought up what seemed like hours earlier was completely gone. Frank could see it in the curve of his shoulders and the complete, dizzying bottomlessness of his eyes.

They stared at each other, silent and breathing in the empty tunnel. Party looked almost uncertain when he straightened up, running his hand through his hair like Frank had seen Kobra do in the past. “Uh,” the man said, and Frank felt a tiny surge of pride at just how broken Party’s voice was.

Just then, the Drac’s radio crackled and a dead gargle came through.

“Crows,” Frank panted. “Fuck, they’re going to come here. They’ll see the bodies. We have to run.”

“Run,” Party repeated, nodding. He licked his lips, and charged his gun again. “Right.”

They took off, Frank leading the way down the twists and turns they had to navigate through to get to the front of the club. Ten relied on the labyrinth to hide it, and didn’t have much in the way of security at its front. Seconds before they took their last right turn, Frank had the presence of mind to check around the corner. Party practically barreled into him when he stopped in his tracks just before they hit the group of three Crows heading their way. They had less than a minute before the troop reached them. Frank had to think fast again. “Crows,” he hissed to Party.

“I’ll take ‘em,” Party answered.

“No you won’t,” Frank whispered. “You stay here.”

“Don’t have to be chivalrous,” Party snapped.

“Shut the fuck up and stay back,” Frank hissed back.

“No!” Party whispered.

Frank listened to the soft padding of Crow boots, and ground his teeth together. Party Poison could be so fucking obstinate, but he was their _leader_. The Killjoys had run just fine before Frank had joined them, but they hadn’t even _existed_ before Party Poison. And here he was, ready to jump head first into danger at every opportunity. Frank had taken Crows out without weapons before, and even if Party had too, they were _so close_ to a potential trap, and it was Party who needed to survive. Frank twisted his body away from Party and curled his hand into a fist, which he brought right into Party’s face, the force of his shoulder behind it. “Down,” Frank hissed, as Party’s gun clattered away from him.

That should hold the man for a good five seconds, which with a flasher would be more than enough for Frank. He took a breath, and dove out from behind the wall. He caught the Crow in front in the chest on his second shot. The thing toppled forward, still running right at Frank. All it took was for him to reach his arms out, and he had an instant, body-sized shield.

Of course, Crows were smart. And _these_ ones were on high alert, semi-automatic flashers in hand. The one on the right fired two rounds of light into where Frank’s chest was protected by the smoking Crow. The one on the left tilted its head to the side and aimed his gun down, to where Frank’s legs were exposed beneath the dead Crow.

Frank hadn’t been watching that one: he’d been too busy shooting the dumb one in the head. The burning hot ray of light skimmed past his leg, burning a hole in his pants and all the way down to his leg muscle. He choked on his own scream, and grabbed the dead Crow’s gun from its side.

It wouldn’t work for him, coded like it was, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t throw it up in the air. If there was one thing that Frank knew about people it was that they were visually oriented. A flash of bright white-on-black movement would make most stop and stare, even if it was just for a split second. And that was enough for him to catch the last Crow between the eyes with a retaliating blast of light before he fell to his knees, clutching at his leg in pain.

 _Don’t look at it, don’t look at it,_ he repeated in his mind, thinking vaguely about how nice it was that he hadn’t bitten through his tongue when the shot had burned his leg.

“Ghoul!” Party shouted. “I’m going to _kill_ you. Don’t you _ever_ do that again, you hear?”

Frank’s eyes weren’t open, they were shut against the blinding light, but he felt Party’s hand on his shoulder for a second before it was gone.

“I’m afraid,” said a voice that made Frank’s heart stop in his chest and his body turn towards the source, gun raised and primed even as shivers traveled down his spine, “that you’ll have to wait in line.”

Korse grinned, teeth as white as his ugly, bald head. “You see,” he said, tilting his head to the side as he traced Party’s jawline with his standard issue ray gun, “I’d quite like a go at him if you don’t mind, my dear.”

Party’s face twisted into a scowl. “Shoot him,” he said to Frank.

“Well,” Korse pouted, eyes on Frank, “That’s quite enough out of you.”

“NO!” Frank shouted.

Korse had turned his gun around, and smashed it into Party’s temple. He looked disgusted at the limp body in his arms, and passed the Killjoy off to one of what looked like ten Crows standing around him. “Gun down now,” he said. “This little dance of ours isn’t done, but I’m bored. I’ve decided to speed things up a little.” He laughed, and clapped his hands together. “Yes, I see you’ve realized that our game has a time limit, well _done_. But I’m afraid I’m not going to give you the next piece of the puzzle. You’ll have to figure it out on your own. I said,” he snapped, face contorting, “gun. _Down_. You’ll do as I say. Now.”

Frank dropped his gun. His hands were shaking too badly for him to do anything with it, anyway. He could hear whines coming from all sides, and he was just kneeling in a pile of Crows while Party hung from one of their arms, head lolling about like he was a broken doll.

“I’m going to have my Crows knock you out now,” Korse said. “But I daresay we’ll meet again. And quite soon.”

He grinned as Frank felt a sharp pain to the back of his head.

As he faded away, a voice and a maniacal laugh followed him down into the spiraling dark.

_“Keep running, Frank Iero.”_


End file.
